Do Newcastle Really Want The Europa League Next Season?

It will be almost impossible for Newcastle to make the top four in the Premier League this season, and maybe the best we can do is 5th or 6th place at best.

Alan Pardew – would he welcome the Europa League next season? And if we do well and go on another winning run after our two successive defeats, then Newcastle could even qualify again for the Europa League, and heaven forbid, if we have a good run in the FA Cup and get to the final we could even qualify that way as well.

Over the last few seasons we’ve seen some poor sides represent England in the Europa League, and that’s because the winners of the FA Cup and the League Cup qualify, or even the losers can qualify under certain circumstances, while in most other European countries the Europa League positions are given to those clubs who finish highest in the league table.

And so we’ve had even relegated sides like Birmingham and Wigan be in the Europa League over the last few seasons, and that’s one reason the PL is now rated second behind the Spanish League in Europe.

And it’s interesting that Sunderland and West Ham – bottom and second bottom of the league at the moment – are in the semi-finals of the League Cup.

Of course if the FA stop sending the winners of these local Cups to Europe then they would very quickly degenerate and top sides would simply play their second elevens, as some top teams do now.

The Europa League is nothing like the Champions League and there are more games, less money and less prestige than the Champions League, and some English teams have struggled with so many games to play.

Swansea are doing a Newcastle this season, and they just don’t have a big enough squad to do well in both leagues, much like Newcastle last season, and Swansea have also suffered a lot of injuries so far this season.

One change the Europa League must make is to stop sending sides who have failed to qualify for the knockout stages of the Champions League (CL) and finish 3rd in their group, down to the Europa League (EL).

The way it works right no is a source of extra games and CL teams make up eight teams of the final 32 of the EL – only teams who start in the competition should be able to win the competition – and maybe the group stages end up with 16 teams left – which is what happens in the Champions League.

Those changes would make the EL just like the CL in terms of format and the number of games played – and that’s the way it should be surely.

And Chelsea became the first holders of the Champions League not to qualify for the knockout stages o that competition last season – but they ended up winning the Europa League. 🙁

Of course if Newcastle are to become a top side again, then we will need to be in Europe, and have the squad to cope with the extra games.

Let us know if would like to see Newcastle in the Europa League next season.

Of course we need Europe ! We must always strive to improve the team finances generated will push Ash to spend more=Europe Shola needs to be only used as a sub IMO as he just cannot do a full game. Hopefully Cisse a chance soon alongside Remy, even if Remy needs to go out wide.

i’m sorry ed but this question is total bollocks. how can a club not want to be in rope??? that would be like having no ambition at all.. we must get into europe this season to attract better players! and we need to sign a couple more to replace ameobi, coloccini, cissé,…

Have you ever seen Marv show any consistency in the time he’s been here ? We need players who will show up every game not once in a blue moon. I think you need to take off the rose tinted specs and realise Marveaux was a budget buy / high risk who has not paid off.

The problem is our flair players like Marv and Benny are absolutely brilliant for very short periods during a game – but not enough to change the course of a game in our favour very often. It is not their skills I would question but their mindset. Top sports people need judgement, application and commitment as well as skill. Our flair players are also rans compared with the best. Benny’s decision making is so off the wall that it almost negates his abilities in getting into such threatening positions

Top 8 is a good achievement in a highly competitive league. Tottenham will surely improve in the second half as will Man U. I’m happy with the side and the manager.

Would like to see more of Cisse, Benny and Gutierrez in the 2nd half of the season and the addition of a quality attacking central mid who chimes in with goals, and farewell to Marv and Obertan and one or two others, who I can’t see any role for.

As for Europa – it’s the poor relation tournament but the Toon owner should want for us to be in Europe every season if he wants his player assets to accumulate in value – to take the cynical view of his motivation

We need the Europa League like we need a hole in the head. When we played in the Fairs Cup, we played teams that had finished second or third in their leagues, and in many cases they went on to win their leagues in the year we defeated them e.g. Feyenoord, Ujpest, etc.

Now the CL sweeps up second, third and in some cases forth placed sides, so the teams that get in the Europa have no comparison to the teams we played when we won the Fairs Cup. In fact, our first match in Europe saw us defeat the team that became WORLD CLUB champions 18 months later. That would not happen with the Europa.

HD @1 – I think with Marveaux there is obviously something going on that we don’t know about if he is not even on the bench – this may or may not be Pardew’s fault. I fully agree with Ed that the clubs falling out of the CL into the EL is ridiculous. These clubs have already played 6 CL games and earned a reasonable amount of money – in my opinion once you are knocked out a cup competition you are out end of.

I think they changed the rules this season, so the losing finalists will NOT qualify for Europe. It’s winners only, and if the winner is already qualified, it’s transferred to the best placed Premier League team not already qualified.

It has been stated often enought the our Illustrious Owner is ONLY interested in the PL and finishing between 10th and 6th. He doesnt want Cup distractions or Europe as the return on investment is not worth the risk to the players.

Pardew has said HE would like to win one of the Domestic cup competitions, but his view isnt supported from above!! There is no ambition from above other than to remain in top half of table and bring in the milk & honey from the gate receipts and the TV money!!!

Ambition – its something the fans have, but it would appear to be a view not shared by the management.

We’ve got the making not just of a quality team but also a squad. Fergie always blooded the youngsters in games now n again when the team was doin well. Pards isn’t doin that even when he sees the lads are exhausted. Ok,Pards has used Vukcic,Fergie,Sammy and Dummetta few times and they’ve done alright at times. He really needs to use the squad. We had Mbiwa,Cisse,Anita and others on the sidelines and even though he knew many first teamers were exhausted he didn’t use the decent squad players available-his fault that we looked lackluster. Surely after watching the rubbish we saw yesterday these lads couldn’t have done any worse

Last season when we were playing in the Europa Cup, the players used in the early group games were squad players and those needing to gain form. This was the best use of our squad and led to qualification, so the excuse of injuries and fatigue from Pardew was bogus (as usual). Perhaps there was a slight impact on domestic cup games but the kudos from playing in Europe has more of an advantage.

id sell ben arfa no problem as long as carbella comes in but if he doesnt then leaves us a man short plus we also need at least 2 strikers, a midfielder who is a workaholic in midfield and who can gell with toite,cabaye. also id love to know why we dont use sossiskos height more hes 6ft 3 at least so use it id put him up top with a new striker me remember macdonald used to be a left back until joe harvey converted him into a striker so why not

I do think that Ashley is trying to do it the right way, however, it’s not the “football” way.

On N de Jong, if I’m honest, if he’s inexpensive (and if we ignore the whole Ben Arfa-gate), I would actually mind him in the squad….. Hopefully he can Kung-Fu Suarez like he did to Alonso that time 😉 (joking… somewhat)

Present 8th position is the best the Toon can hope for. Talk of Europe is a nonsense look what happened last season. Remember last season when players were blooded in the Europa League, why have they not progressed to the first team? 2/3 players are no longer giving decent performances. Can’t say that the rest of the season will hold much joy for Toon fans.

However, the articles do say that the chairman is willing to negotiate quite a bit as they are desperate for cash, and NUFC are good for offering cash straight up, which is a little uncommon in football

I could see that price drop down quite a bit. Hopefully we have a good relationship with Montpellier as we have bought Mbiwa from them just last year.

I wouldnt rule out the prospect of us selling krul in this window to be honest, I do blame him for wba loss and partly arsenal loss as well yeah he had a good game v spurs but i do like our other keeper we would need to bring in a new keeper but they have been watching readings keeper havent they just wonder if somethings in this

Sir erec Not 100% sure but I’m pretty sure the crazy ass mofo in charge of Montpellier was absolutely livid over Yanga leaving and was pretty uncomplimentary about the toon! Or was that the Lille chairman…….., Or Toulouse……………!

The Europa league is far to much of an easy excuse for not performing when we played a second string for much of it. Swansea and Spurs are pretty much where they were this time last season.

The point is we didn’t build on the season we fluked 5th and I can’t see us overhauling any of the 7 teams above us no. So how is finishing 8th going to get any pulses racing now and be of use to anyone?

Whenever Pardew reaches a position of strength, that lack of an X factor in management ability always fatally kicks in.

Other managers would have rotated and rested players. Pardew has ours running on empty in a system which creates criminally few chances every game as our creative, attacking flair players are systematically discarded one by one.

health update

I was diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer in February 2017 and completed four months of chemotherapy in late July and will continue to have hormone treatment.

After having various cat scans and a full bone scan recently, I met with the medical oncologist yesterday for a review of my condition.

The cancer in the bones has stabilized and has not spread further, and my PSA count has decreased significantly to being less than 0.1.

I am still recovering from some of the side effects of the chemo treatment - mainly severe fatigue and exhaustion.

Stage 4 cancer is not curable so I will continue to have cat scans and bone scans every four months to ensure the disease is not spreading.

Hopefully, the hormone treatment will keep working for a while yet and then we will switch to some other treatments that have been developed over the last few years.

It is as it is - I accept it - and will do the very best I can under the circumstances.

Ed Harrison

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